


Brain Sludge

by beary_scary



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Blood, Crying, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Flashbacks, Fluff, Hurt Peter Parker, Hurt/Comfort, Irondad, Its more like, Mind Control, Mind Manipulation, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Protective Avengers, Protective Bucky Barnes, Protective Steve Rogers, Protective Tony Stark, Sensory Overload, Violence, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-11
Updated: 2020-07-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:22:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25193854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beary_scary/pseuds/beary_scary
Summary: Peter's enhanced senses have helped him on multiple occasions, but while helping the Avengers in a routine battle, he will realize that his enhanced senses aren't always a blessing.ORPeter needs help and he has a genius mentor, a 90-year-old man who punched Nazis, a girl who can control anyone and anything with her mind, two ex-assassins, a man who dropped everything to help take down HYDRA, and a scientist with 7 Ph.D.'s to lend him a hand.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes & Peter Parker, Peter Parker & Avengers Team, Peter Parker & Natasha Romanov, Peter Parker & Steve Rogers, Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 19
Kudos: 384





	Brain Sludge

**Author's Note:**

> I finished this in a day and forgot to wear my glasses the whole time so I may have a lazy eye tomorrow I hope y'all enjoy!
> 
> This is an AU that takes place after Civil War. The Avengers had their fight but Tony, Steve, and Bucky made up at Siberia. There's still some tension between Bucky, Steve, and Tony, but they're working it out. All the Avengers know Peter and his identity so there's that too.
> 
> TW: Blood, Mind Control/Manipulation, Flashbacks to Minor Character's Death, Sensory Overload, shitty ending

Peter was sitting in his third-period calculus class when the earth shook. His classmates began to yell about earthquakes as Mrs. Myriad attempted to calm the terrified teenagers. 

Why couldn’t he ever have a normal day? It was a Monday, which normally sucked, but this Monday was actually going pretty well. Flash hadn’t bothered him as much, MJ gave him a book recommendation that wasn’t science-related (“Sometimes, you just need to get out of your head, Bill Nye,” she’d said), he and Ned made plans for that night (they were going to have a ‘Mystery Science Theater 3000’ watch-a-thon), and he even passed his Spanish test (thanks to Mr. Delmar tutoring him). So yeah, today was pretty good but Peter didn’t need his spidey sense to tell him that it was going to go to complete shit pretty soon. 

“Holy shit,” looking to his right, Peter saw Ned attempting to look up what was happening on his phone, “Dude,” His friend whispered, “the Avengers are fighting some dude a couple blocks from here,”

As those words escaped Ned’s mouth, the chaos in the classroom rose to a crescendo as their classmates attempted to escape the building. “Are you sure?” Peter asked, “I don’t think TMZ is a reliable source.”

A piercing alarm began to echo across the school and Peter couldn’t help but flinch. Having super senses really sucked sometimes. The evacuation alarm solidified the hysteria as Peter and Ned were pushed along with the swarm of teenagers.

Somehow in the middle of everything happening Ned made direct eye contact with Peter, “Gee,” He began in an exaggerated tone, “I wonder if Spider-Man is gonna join the Avengers?” He finished his performance with a frantic eyebrow raise and Peter couldn’t help but roll his eyes. Of course, Spider-Man would be there.

He gave his friend a nod before separating from the mass of students. Quickly making his way into an empty alleyway, Peter changed into his suit and webbed his bag _behind_ the nearest dumpster. He’d learned his lesson from the last time he left it on the front of a dumpster. That lecture from Aunt May was definitely not a fun one.

“Hey, Karen,” He greeted as he climbed to the top of an apartment building.

 _“Hello, Peter,”_ She projected a map of Queens in the corner of his eye display, _“The Avengers are fighting an enemy who had threatened civilians twelve blocks from here,”_ Karen informed him while highlighting the area that the Avengers were apparently fighting in.

Looking towards that direction, Peter immediately saw the red and gold glint of the Iron Man armor along with the wings of Falcon flying above whatever the newest threat was, “Thanks, Karen,” he gratified as he began his trip towards the battle.

As he began closing in on the targeted area Karen was speaking to him again, _“The Big Boss is requesting to speak with you,”_

“You know, I really don’t think that’s necess-”

_“The Big Boss is no longer requesting.”_

Peter almost sighed with relief until he realized that “no longer requesting” didn’t mean his mentor had given up,

“Peter. No.” The grumpy voice of Tony Stark filled his ears.

“Peter, yes!” He rebutted poorly.

He could have sworn that Mr. Stark’s sigh rattled his brain, “Kid, this is Avengers business. No need for Itsy-Bitsy to be crawling around,” 

“But I’m already here, Mr. Stark! And if I’m already here, then I might as well help out, right?” Peter tried to convince the older man as he landed on a building overlooking the battle. 

“Woah,” From his position, Peter could see Ms. Romanoff fighting some strange triangle-shaped robots alongside Mr. Barnes. Mr. Wilson was still in the sky fighting off some more robots alongside Mr. Stark. Mr. Rogers was with Ms. Maximoff and it looked like they were trying to fight their way towards the main source of the chaos.

Peter had met all of the Avengers a handful of times when he’d gone to the tower to help Mr. Stark with stuff in the lab. None of them seemed especially keen on getting to know him until Ms. Romanoff invited him to spar and he revealed himself as Spider-Man. Since then, he’s helped them with a few low-level in-state missions here and there. 

“Fine but the second you disobey orders, I’m spraying you with ‘RAID’ again,” Mr. Stark grumbled obviously not happy about Peter being out of school to help with this issue.

“Oh sweet! I won’t let you down, Mr. Stark!” he vowed. “Karen, connect me to the Avengers frequency,” With that, Peter’s communication devices were now connected to everyone who was currently on the field, “Hey guys!” Peter greeted excitedly.

“Hey, Spidey,”

“Are you skipping class?”

“Look who finally decided to show up,”

“Hey, kid,”

“Give me a hand with this one, Webhead,” 

Following through on his promise, Peter immediately began scouring the sky for whatever issue Sam needed help with. Seeing the robot that was tailing him, Peter quickly shot out a web at the robot pulled him down to the ground. As it crashed, the robot let out a burst of air that flipped a car into the air only to be stopped by Bucky.

“Woah, are those things shooting sonic waves?” He asked excitedly. Logically, Peter knew that these robots were dangerous and used for evil _but_ the science that went behind harnessing sonic waves and weaponizing them was too interesting and complicated for him not to be at least a little bit amazed by it.

Mr. Stark flew over him and blasted another one of the bots, “Yep, they’re almost as headache-inducing as you,”

Peter chuckled, “You sure you’re not just sensitive from old age?” That earned him a few laughs through the communications line that Peter couldn’t help but preen at. The Avengers laughed at his joke that he made at the expense of Iron Man. How crazy was his life?

“He’s got you there, Stark,” Wanda taunted as she slammed two bots into each other.

Tony’s retort was cut off by Steve, “Spidey, wanna help us out down here?” It was phrased as a question but coming from Captain America, Peter definitely considered it an order.

“Yes sir, Mr. Rogers! I’m on my way,” Getting a running start, he jumped off the building’s roof and slung his way towards the area he lost saw the iconic red and blue shield.

A tired sigh came through the coms and Peter could see Steve drop his shoulders in an added sign of exhaustion, “Pete, how many times have I told you to call me ‘Steve’?”

“Sorry, Mr. Steve!” 

“Once you web this guy up, we’ll talk formalities,” Wanda compromised as she and Steve closed in on the man in charge.

At the beginning of the battle, when the team was called in, the man had introduced himself as “War Cry” (FRIDAY did a facial scan and found that his real name was Lucio Bianchi). Apparently, his father was a war hero during World War II but his achievements were overshadowed by those of Captain America and The Howling Commandos. So now this guy was exacting revenge on Steve and Bucky for erasing his father’s heroics from history. 

The two super-soldiers had felt guilty and even pitied Lucio, that was until he released what seemed to be a hundred sound wave-harnessing robots in the middle of Manhattan. 

Peter landed on top of an over-turned taxi and flipped onto the street next to Steve. The veteran greeted him with a kind smile and a serious nod. The two were soon joined by Wanda landing gracefully on Steve’s other side. She and Peter waved to each other before looking to the Captain for their next move.

“Okay,” he pointed towards a cluster of robots, “Tony said that those bots over there are protecting Bianchi so he can securely control the other robots,” Steve turned to Wanda, “I need you to pull the blockade apart long enough for Spidey and I to get through and take Bianchi out,” He switched his attention to Peter, “you and I are gonna go in there to disable his controls and web him up, okay?” 

The fifteen-year-old nodded, “Got it,” he affirmed.

“Alright,” Steve straightened up and diverted his gaze to the clump of robots, “on my mark,” Noting that he wouldn’t be able to swing through the opening, Peter gets into a running stance and blocks out any other members of the team talking in his ear. He and Cap had similar enhanced abilities so they would probably be able to run at the same speed, he just had to focus and keep up with the older man. 

“Go!”

Peter and Steve ran towards the blockade of bots as a red light surrounded them and quickly pulled them far enough apart for the two to go through. The red light flickered and Peter knew that Wanda wouldn’t be able to hold it open that much longer. Tapping Steve on the arm, he brought this observation to the Captain’s attention, “Mr. Steve? We may want to speed up,” The man nodded and sped up his sprint. Peter matched his pace and the two finally made it through the wall of robots.

Once inside, they slowed down enough to see Bianchi holding a tablet that seemed to be his way of controlling the swarm. 

Thinking quickly, Peter shot a web at the device and pulled it into his own hands, “I’ll take that, thank you!” Seeing that they didn’t have time to figure out the particular controls of the tablet, Peter shrugged, “Yeet!” he yelled as the tablet went flying into the side of a building. 

The tablet smashed and the robots went with it. They all began shutting down in groups until there were no more online.

Using both hands, Peter shot streams of webbing at Bianchi, trapping him to the brick wall of the building behind him. The teenager received a pat on the shoulder from Captain America as a sign of approval. There’s a sentence he never thought he’d think.

Steve and Peter walked towards the now defenseless Lucio Bianchi, “I thought Tony told you not to make references during serious situations,” Steve asked, amused.

Peter rolled his eyes behind his mask, “When has Mr. Stark ever been serious in any situation? And also, 'yeet' isn't a reference, it's an exclamation, thus, I'm not disobeying him,” 

The older man laughed, “Good point,” The two heroes finally approached the bedraggled Bianchi without acknowledging Bucky and Wanda approaching them. The others must be cleaning up some of the wreckage, “I’m sorry about what happened to your father, Lucio, but we’re going to have to take you in,” Steve said in his “patriotic voice” as Sam likes to call it.

Bianchi chuckled, “How do you think your team would feel if you were to turn on them, Captain? Would they feel betrayed just as my father did?” Peter saw the man slightly reach into his sleeve and pull out a small device, “If you step any closer, I could make that into a reality, Captain Rogers,” Peter was able to see Steve hesitate slightly, “for you _and_ for Seargent Barnes.”

Steve tensed as the man mentioned Bucky. Turning his head slightly, Peter saw the man in question stop in his movements. This man threatened to make two super soldiers turn on their own team and there was no telling how he was going to do it.

Wanda approached Steve and Peter, “He’s not lying. I can feel his intent and he truly believes he’s able to put you and Bucky under his control,” This only made the two soldiers tense further, no doubt remembering Barnes’s previous experiences with being under someone’s control. 

Feeling helpless, Peter waited for someone to tell him what to do. This was an “I need an adult” moment, as Tony liked to call them. Moments where he should sit back and let one of the adults take care of the situation. 

“We disabled your robots, you have nothing else to protect yourself, Bianchi,” Steve began to negotiate but it was obvious to everyone in the vicinity that he was becoming increasingly angrier with each word, “It would be better for you if you just let us bring you in,” he finished.

Bianchi laughed, “Nothing to protect myself, huh? What better protection than two genetically enhanced super-soldiers?” As he finished speaking, he pressed down on the small device Peter saw earlier.

Nothing happened.

Wanda, Bucky, Steve, and Peter tensed as they waited with bated breaths to see that would happen. A sense of dread began to fill Peter’s stomach as his spidey senses began to go off. 

A small noise began to emit from the device in Bianchi’s hand.

“What the-” Peter cut himself off as the small noise rose to a piercing whine that made his teeth itch. Unable to stop himself, Peter let out a whimper and grabbed his head in pain. The noise continued to increase until everything went white.

The three adults watched as the youngest of their group let out a small noise of pain and grasped at his head. Steve quickly grabbed Peter as he began to sink to the ground, still fighting off the apparent pain in his head. 

“I-I don’t understand,” Bianchi stuttered, “it should be affecting Rogers and Barnes, not the arachnid,” he insisted.

Watching as Wanda and Steve tried to get Peter to communicate, Bucky noted that he could hear a small noise but his hearing wasn’t sensitive enough to truly register it. That must be what caused Peter’s pain. He remembered when the boy sat down with him and Steve to ask their advice on dealing with enhanced senses. They soon found out that Peter’s senses were way more sensitive than their’s but still gave the kid some advice. Looking back at the small form of Spider-Man as he began writhing in Steve’s arms, Bucky couldn’t help but think that no amount of advice could help in this scenario.

Steve turned away from Peter as he heard the sound of repulsers come closer, “Guys, be careful when you approach. Bianchi did something to Spider-Man and we don’t know what yet,” he said into his com.

Bucky spoke up, “Steve, I think he's doing something to his hearing,” 

The blonde nodded, “You’re probably right,” The two shared grim looks.

Wanda stood up and purposefully approached the man webbed to the wall. She raised a threatening red hand, “What did you do to him?” Wanda snarled.

Bianchi watched as the other Avengers approached the fallen spider. Wiping the confused look off his face, he grinned, “The question you should be asking is: What is he going to do to you?”

At her inquiring look, Bianchi watched as Tony Stark stepped out of his Iron Man suit to run towards Spider-Man.

“Spider-Man!” He yelled.

All the heroes looked up at him with varying expressions of anger and confusion, but Bianchi only paid attention to one of them, “Get up and release me from these webs,”

Everyone watched as Peter stopped thrashing around and stood up. He slowly turned towards Bianchi and began walking towards him only to be intercepted by Steve’s hand on his chest, “Pete, I don’t know what he’s doing but you need to snap out of it,” He pleaded. It was clear that whatever the self-proclaimed “War Cry” did was affecting Peter’s control over himself.

“Don’t let them get in our way, Spider-Man!” Bianchi yelled before his mouth was enveloped with Wanda’s magic and he was silenced. 

Steve watched as Spider-Man’s emotionless eyes seemed to stare through him as he reached a spandex-clad hand up to Steve’s. The blonde man had no time to react before his arm was twisted and he was thrown to the side.

Realizing how serious this situation was becoming, Bucky dashed over to Peter and attempted to restrain his arms. Now closer to the teen, it was clear to Bucky that he was attempting to fight the orders he was given. The shaking in his shoulders and jerky head movements reaffirmed this analysis.

“Stark! Try to talk to him!” Bucky shouted, “He’s trying to break through it,”

Tony shakily approached them and stood next to Bucky, “Hey, Underoos-”

Bucky cut in, “Don’t call him that or refer to Spider-Man. You have to make it personal to get through to him,” He informed Tony. 

The billionaire would normally retort with snark biting at his tongue but the best he could do was shakily nod, “I need- I need you to listen to me, Peter,” The quivering in Peter’s shoulders strengthened, “I don’t know what he’s doing to you but I know you’re strong enough to fight it,”

Sam and Nat were slowly approaching them with Steve’s arms around their shoulders. Obviously, Peter wasn’t able to hold back his strength like he normally did. This revelation put them all on edge because they knew how strong the young boy could be when he wanted to. 

Tony continued to address the fifteen-year-old, “As much fun as it would be to watch you kick Cap’s ass, I’d prefer it be when you had control of yourself, got it? So you need to snap out of it,”

Peter’s struggling only seemed to increase. Bucky had to push Tony back so he could get a better grip on the flailing Spider-Man. As he adjusted his grip, Bucky saw something that made his blood run cold, “Shit,” he cursed.

“What? What is it?” Tony asked frantically before pulling a phone from his pocket, “FRI, get diagnostics from Karen,” he ordered.

“His ears,” Bucky grunted, “The noise is making his ears bleed,”

FRIDAY’s accented voice echoed through the decimated area, _“Karen has reported that Spider-Man’s heart rate has reached a dangerously fast pace. His blood pressure is spiking. There seems to be trauma to both his eardrums allowing minimum access to hearing.”_

Sam swore, “What the hell is doing that to him?” 

“What’s messing with his ears, FRI?” Tony asked shakily.

 _“My scanners are picking up a high-frequency noise similar to that of a dog whistle. It seems that Spider-Man’s enhanced hearing has made it so he is the only individual in the vicinity able to hear this particular frequency. A particular note from Karen states that the frequency seems to be targeting the limbic system of his brain, boss,”_ the AI finished her report. Tony muttered a “thanks” before putting his phone back in his pocket.

After FRIDAY’s explanation, Sam felt most of Steve’s weight being shifted onto him and turned his head to see Nat stalking towards Bianchi and Wanda.

Nat had noticed the small device in the man’s hand and how he seemed to be attempting to hide it from Wanda who could do nothing but keep the man muzzled as she stared at Peter with tearful eyes. 

They had all gotten attached to the young vigilante once they began to invite him to training sessions and movie nights. During which, Nat would teach him some of her own moves. While they didn’t have the same body types, they both favored agility over strength (even when Peter could lift more than Steve and Bucky). 

Wanda and Peter were closest in age which built an automatic bond between the two. The twenty-year-old and the fifteen-year-old would often talk about Peter’s high school life, social media trends, and would often watch films together. Seeing him in pain pulled at her heartstrings in a way that only Pietro had been capable of doing. 

Natasha couldn’t help herself as she pulled a blade from her thigh holster and pressed it against Bianchi’s throat, “Give me the device,” She growled into his face and held her hand in front of his left hand, the one she saw him fiddling with. The man mutely glared at her in defiance. Shrugging, the Black Widow swiftly switched her blade to her right hand and stabbed it through Bianchi’s left wrist. 

His screams of pain were muffled by the mystical muzzle Wanda kept around his mouth. Taking advantage of his weakened state, Natasha pried the device from his shaking fingers and turned to Barnes. Careful not to bring the USB drive-sized device any closer to Peter’s shaking form, she held it up for Bucky to see, “Is this what’s causing it?” she asked. Bucky nodded as he and Steve continued to restrain the teenager with blood leaking through his suit. Steve must have joined him shortly after she approached Bianchi.

Not giving the offending remote another thought, Natasha pulled the back of it open and ripped apart any wires she could find. She had wanted to crush it with all her anger put into the action, but didn’t know if the impact would hit the activation button. 

Peter sagged in Bucky and Steve’s arms as the device was killed. He was faintly aware of him being laid down and his head being propped on someone’s lap. A trail of liquid ran down the sides of his face and neck, making him uncomfortable. His attention was taken away from the tickling feeling as someone removed his mask. Oh hey, it’s Mr. Stark.

His mentor’s lips were moving but no sound was coming from him. Huh. That’s weird. Peter’s body felt like it was floating as he stared up at the sky. Hopefully Mr. Stark didn’t think he was being rude, he just wanted to look at the clouds. Why was he laying down? Oh yeah, the noise. That was painful. Where did it go? 

Mr. Wilson’s face came into view and Peter tried to smile at the man but he wasn’t sure what the outcome of his attempt was. He could faintly feel fingers touching his ears. What was wrong with his ears? 

Hm, all of this is kind of tiring. Whatever was wrong with his ears is now going to be a Future Peter problem because Present Peter didn’t want to deal with that. He wanted to sleep. Yeah, sleep sounds good.

Tony couldn’t help the panicked feeling he got as Peter’s eyes closed shut. The whole time his head was in his lap, the kid didn’t reply to anything they had said to him. 

Sam noticed the engineer was beginning to panic and laid a calming hand on his shoulder, “It’s okay, he needs to rest. We’ll get him to the tower and Cho and Banner will put their big brains together and help him, okay? But right now, he needs to rest a little bit,” Sam explained calmly, “He’ll be okay, Tony,”

Tony nodded, “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right. I’m gonna fly him to the tower,” He looked up at Steve, “Can you guys handle the clean-up for right now?” 

Steve looked at the maskless Spider-Man with gentle eyes, “We’ve got it under control here,” he affirmed, “just make sure Spidey gets taken care of,” the soldier gently added.

Tony silently nodded and put Peter’s mask back over his face and passed him to Sam to hold temporarily. 

The ex-pararescue gingerly held Peter’s head to his chest, ignoring the blood staining his Falcon suit. 

Tony numbly let his suit encase his body before kneeling down and gathering Spider-Man’s crumbled form in his arms once again. Sparing a glance to Bianchi’s whimpering form, Tony looked at Bucky with stormy eyes, “Take care of him,” the other man nodded in response. Understanding the underlying implications of Tony’s words. 

Steve, having heard this, didn’t even interject. Technically they were told to simply take the guy down. If “taking him down” may involve the Black Widow and White Wolf wiping the man from existence, who is he to disobey such orders? And what kind of team leader would he be if he didn’t lend a helping hand?

Tony made it back to the Avengers Tower in record time. He was in the med bay for not even thirty seconds before he was swarmed by Dr. Cho’s medical staff. He numbly allowed them to take Peter into the observation room.

Tony was only slightly aware of Bruce slowly guiding him towards the waiting area. Sitting in the comfortable chairs that he could faintly remember Rhodey insisting on investing in due to “how often your dumbasses end up here” referring to the medical floor. He never realized how true that statement was until now.

Time moved differently as Tony waited for any news on Peter. He remembered someone coming out of the observation room to ask for Bruce’s assistance for a scan of some kind. Bruce’s apologies for having to leave his side fell on deaf ears. Too soon.

Two hours passed until Tony was joined by Bucky, Wanda, and Sam. The latter explained that Steve and Nat had to debrief some higher-ups and explain where “War Cry” went. Tony didn’t ask for the answer to that last query but he did exchange glances with Bucky. His firm nod and steely eyes confirmed his thoughts.

Steve and Nat joined them shortly before Bruce stepped out of the observation room. There were small speckles of blood on his white coat.

The nervous man offered the waiting group a hopeful smile, “He’s resting now,” the sighs of relief echoed through the room as Bruce continued, “We did some scans and found that his healing factor is already fixing his eardrums,” The scientist’s expression became more serious, “FRIDAY informed us that the noise targeted the limbic system of his brain aka the emotional control panel of the brain. This means that particular frequency was meant to cause so much pain and discomfort to whoever hears it, that the person can only find relief in following the commands of whoever has control of the frequency,” Bruce finished.

They all took a minute to take the information in before Wanda broke the silence, “How does that work? Why do the commands give relief?” She asked. The others looked to Bruce for his answer, wondering the same thing.

“He would decrease the frequency whenever Peter followed a command. So if Peter does what he says, the pain lessens. If he doesn’t, the pain increases,” If Bruce didn’t have as much control over himself as he did, his face would be turning green just by thinking of such a thing being done to the younger hero but due to his constant meditating and therapy sessions, the only sign of Bruce’s anger was the tone in his voice and the way his face flushed red. 

Steve had to get up and leave the room after hearing that. Natasha looked like she wanted to follow him. Bucky clenched his vibranium arm (curtesy of Shuri) as hard as he could without causing damage to it. Sam looked sick to his stomach. Wanda had tears falling from her eyes as she looked at the doors separating them from Peter. Tony had his hand covering his mouth in what seemed like anguish. 

“What’s the final damage report?” Natasha swallowed her emotions enough to ask stoically. 

Bruce gave her a hesitant smile, “Due to his healing factor, he’ll be fine. Although,” he sucked in a sharp breath, “we are expecting him to not have his hearing back to normal for a day or two,”

“Can we see him?” Nobody mentioned the barely controlled quivering in Tony’s voice.

Bruce nodded and gestured for them to follow him into the room. There were a few nurses checking over some machines and a few others cleaning up various tools. In the center of the room was Peter laying on a medical cot. His Spider-Man suit was replaced with a loose white t-shirt and light blue sweatpants. An IV was inserted into his arm along with a heart rate monitor attached to one of his fingers. Both of Peter’s ears had white bandages over them to prevent further damage along with blood leakage.

“We gave him a mild anesthetic,” Bruce told them quietly, “which, in his case, is one that would cause a normal person his age to fall into a coma,” he chuckled. His small joke seemed to do the trick as the room’s occupants let out varying chuckles that were accompanied by small smiles.

They stayed in the room with Peter for most of the night before each occupant slowly left. FRIDAY was ordered to inform them if there was any sign of him waking up. By two in the morning, the only ones left in the room were Steve and Tony.

“He’s gonna be okay, Tony,” Steve said quietly. He could tell how much of a toll Peter’s pain took on the genius’s conscience. 

Tony hummed in response, “Where’s Bianchi?” he inquired.

The other man’s jaw clenched, “Bucky took him to see the Hudson,” 

Tony nodded in understanding, “Good. Did anybody else join him?”

“Nat and I may have joined them in some sightseeing,” He vaguely recanted.

Neither one spoke again until six in the morning when Peter’s hand twitched. 

~~********* ~~

~~~~Peter was in and out of consciousness for the twenty-seven hours following his hand twitching. May was contacted and brought to the tower, following in Tony's example of never leaving the boy's side. She whispered reassurances and words of comfort to Peter each time he woke "just in case his hearing is coming back" she reasoned.

Once he regained officially regained consciousness, Peter had a small sensory overload episode that Bruce helped him through. It took less than five minutes before he asked for the nurses to remove the IV and the heart rate monitor from his arm. Not even conscious for five minutes and the kid was already fidgety. Bruce whispered an explanation as to why his ears were bandaged and sensitive to any noise. His healing factor did its job and repaired his eardrums while he was sleeping but now they were very sensitive so he'd have to slowly readjust to hearing normally.

Various Avengers visited the recovery room throughout Peter's recovery period. Said recover period lasted one day before the teenager was already running around the tower and begging to be released.

"He's a strong kid," Bucky said as he, Steve, and Tony watched Spider-Man swing away from the tower. The other two men silently agreed. 

Peter never mentioned the knew "Swaddle the Spider" protocol implemented into his suit which canceled out all noise no matter the pitch. The only acknowledgment of said protocol came on a rainy Thursday night where Peter, still dressed in his Spider-Man suit, requested access to Tony's lab via the window and hugged his shocked mentor. The teenager never gave an explanation, he just wordlessly left. That night's report from Karen revealed the Peter had had another sensory overload episode but it quickly ended once the new protocol was put into action. 

Yeah. He's a strong kid. But even the strongest of people need help sometimes. Tony vowed that he would be the one to help Peter whenever he could. 

**Author's Note:**

> Oh my god that ending was terrible I'm so sorry
> 
> Thank you for reading! Feel free to tell me what you thought about it in the comments!
> 
> In case you couldn't tell, I love canon Steve Rogers's characterization a lil bit more than the Steve Rogers we see in most fics. Steve has thrown a knife through a man's hand, bashed skulls in with his shield, killed HYDRA soldiers, and literally run from international governments because he didn't like the idea of the Avengers being under government control.  
> If you factor all that in, you can not look me in the eyes and tell me that the man who did all that would not allow the harming and/or death of a man who injured a child that he knows and cares for.  
> I also don't like the whole "violence never solved anything" attitude that some people give Steve (no hate, it's just something I've observed) because this man literally fought people he thought were bullies for like,,,,his whole life. I feel like he would be the type to be like "oh you punched a kid? why would you- oh, he was picking on another kid? well did you punch him hard enough? good. go finished your homework" and Bucky would be like "let me show you how to punch properly so you don't fuck up your hands like Steve used to" you know?  
> thank you for coming to my TED talk.


End file.
